Classroom Questions

Questions for ‘New UN climate report finds no time for denial or delay’

people riding in a backhoe amid flooding in China

Super heavy rains earlier this summer flooded Xinxiang, in China’s Henan province. It led to dramatic rescues, like this one. A new U.N. report finds that extreme weather events across the globe have been exaggerated by human-caused climate change.

Cui Nan/China News Service via Getty Images

By Science News Explores

To accompany “New UN climate report finds no time for denial or delay”

SCIENCE

Before Reading:

1.  When scientists refer to climate change, what do they mean? What are its impacts (or symptoms) and causes?

During Reading:

1.  What is the IPCC? What does the IPCC do and who is involved with it?

2.  What did the IPCC recently report about Earth’s climate? Give some examples.

3.  Which extreme events that have been happening does the IPCC report link to climate change?

4.  What are “scenarios” of greenhouse-gas warming? Why did the IPCC report consider many scenarios?

5.  What does the term “net-zero carbon emissions” mean? What scenario includes net-zero carbon emissions?

6.  How might achieving net-zero emissions by 2050 affect Earth’s climate, according to the story?

7.  What near-future effect of climate change is irreversible, according to the report?

8.  How could reducing greenhouse-gas emissions now help limit the worst impacts of climate change?

9.  How many reports has the IPCC released? How has climate science changed since the first report was released? What was a major finding of the last report?

10. What is the Paris Accord? What special report did the IPCC undertake due to that agreement? And what did that report find?

11. What impact do IPCC scientists hope the new report will have?

After Reading:

1.  Adults often look at the world differently than kids do. Adults often have different preferences, priorities and goals. And adults generally do not ask kids if they agree with these before acting on them. Here’s your chance. Your generation will live through the most dramatic events triggered by our evolving climate. Based on what you have learned, what would be your top priorities and goals for dealing with climate change? Explain why these make sense to you, using information from your reading of this story and others (many more are part of our Climate Change Chronicles).